by Lufthansa Flyer | Nov 2, 2011 | Trip Reports |
The end of November kicks off The Christmas Market season throughout Europe. Its a time when cities and villages set up special areas that celebrate the coming of Christmas. These celebrations usually take place in parks or town squares and are comprised of booths selling local foods, holiday decor and other gifts. Typically, they’ll have a children’s area complete with rides, petting zoos and other attractions geared for the kids.
One of the other great things about this time of year, especially around the Thanksgiving Holiday in the US, is that airlines generally offer deeply discounted fares to incent travelers to travel in premium classes to Europe. Last year I took advantage of a $1500.00 business class airfare from home in the US to Nurnberg, Germany to experience their Christmas Market first hand (and to earn enough miles to renew my Star Alliance Gold status level).
When I arrived, I found a town that transformed one of their main squares into a Holiday Celebration that lasts from the end of November and throughout December. Food booths, Spiced Wine Stands, Gingerbread and Gift Ideas were everywhere. The smells of food cooking and wine being heated was unmistakeable. There were easily a couple of hundred places to sample and enjoy the local feel of the holidays. The children’s area was a small amusement park complete with a merry-go-round and other rides. Nurnberg specifically is known for its “Prune People” figurines: a small figure dressed up in various professions, built of prunes, with a walnut for a head. I brought a “Nurse” prune person home for Mrs. LufthansaFlyer (who is a Nurse) and its still sitting on our window sill in the kitchen one year later.
A Typical Booth Found At The Market
Nurnberg's Christmas Market 2010
Plenty of Fantastic Food Booths
Gingerbread EVERYWHERE!
The Famous Prune People Figurines
Gift Ideas of All Kinds......
Holiday Favorites From The Band
A Scene From the Middle of the Market
Another Scene of the Market
One of the Attractions
The Childrens Area
Complete with Merry-Go-Round
And Train Rides......
I was prompted to write this tonight because as I was scouring airfares to Europe, I noticed many fares available on Lufthansa from most US gateway cities to destinations in Germany and further into Europe are at their lowest prices this year. For example, You can fly in Business Class from Chicago to Munich for approximately $1800.00, from the New York Area for about $1600.00. These fares typically require you to leave the Friday after Thanksgiving and you can return almost any day the following week. If you do fly in a premium cabin, you will most likely earn bonus status miles for your frequent flyer account which adds to the benefit of such attractive fares. Usually a business class fare will run between $4000-6000 during other times of the year. Book soon since available seats will start to disappear the closer we get to the holiday weekend.
So why not skip the lines and misery of shopping on Black Friday and take care of your shopping in Europe???? Hop on a plane, enjoy the hospitality of a great Business Class Seat and experience something new that you’ll remember for a long time. You can visit www.christmasmarkets.com and find more information on specific Christmas Markets in Germany and the rest of Europe.
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by Lufthansa Flyer | Oct 29, 2011 | Trip Reports |
On our recent trip to Italy, we flew from our home in the US to Rome via Lufthansa. We had spent a few days in Rome, along with some time in Sorrento and Capri. Along the journey between Rome and Sorrento lies the ancient city of Pompeii. In 79AD, Pompeii was ravaged by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius. During the course of the eruption the city was buried under 20-30 feet of ash over 6 hours.
Today, its regarded as a UNESCO World Heritage Site and for good reason. The ruins are simply magnificent and are a must see if you ever visit the area. Walking through the many streets and among the ruins really does put you back in time. Many times I caught myself imagining what it must have been for a native Pompeiian when they first saw a glimpse of the eruption. As you’ll see in the photos, Vesuvius is an intimidating presence when you look to the northwest.
The eruption was catastrophic to the region. In researching the eruption, scientists estimate that surges of heat from the eruption reached 250 degrees centigrade, 480 degrees fahrenheit. Below, I’ve included pictures of plaster cast of victims that were recreated from the voids found in the ash layers where there bodies laid before decomposing.
In my opinion, if you are ever in the area of Pompeii, make it a point to visit. From Rome, its a very easy bullet train ride to Napoli (Naples). It takes about 1.5 hours on the bullet train, and approximately 2.5 hours on a standard train. The bullet train is nice because it is non-stop and offers a first class and second class fare. From Napoli, its another short local train ride to Pompeii. Lufthansa also provides non-stop service to Napoli (Naples) from both Munich and Frankfurt. The flights are approximately 1.5 to 2 hours.
The entrance to the ruins is 100 yards/meters from the train station so it is very easy to reach. There is a modest admission fee to the ruins, but it is very much worth it. There are tours that you can join that are offered in various languages for an additional charge. But if you’re like me, you’ll want to walk around Pompeii your way and take your time and enjoy.
This is the view of Vesuvius when you first enter Pompeii. You immediately sense just how close the Volcano is and what little chance there was to survive.
An example of the ruins. They have been very well perserved. Its impossible to tell that these buildings were covered by 25 feet of volcanic ash:
What impressed me was the ability for columns to survive the eruption. Perhaps having less surface area exposed to the eruption helped them remain standing:
A beautiful remain of a temple:
From Pompeii’s Forum, again notice Vesuvius in the background……..
A statue of Apollo:
Views down various streets:
Here are the images of the remains of a few of the citizens of Pompeii. You’ll notice that a few of the victims appear to not have had enough time to react and were “frozen” while they were in the process of moving. Some you’ll notice appear to be bracing themselves or trying to shield themselves from the heat of the eruption. The bodies are also smaller than I expected. These bodies are made of plaster casts. During the excavations, they discovered voids in the ash layers that resembled human forms and injected them with plaster to recreated the last moments of some of the victims lives. This was simply amazing to look at.
Scenes from the Amphitheater which seems to have had survived the eruption fairly well:
Pompeii was definitely a highlight of the trip for me. To be able to walk down the same streets and enter the same buildings as residents of Pompeii had almost 2000 years ago really puts things in perspective as to where we are on the timeline of mankind.
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by Lufthansa Flyer | Oct 26, 2011 | Trip Reports |
Last week my wife and I spent 10 days in Italy between Rome, Sorrento and Capri. We saw many amazing sites including some of the Amalfi Coast, The Vatican, The Roman Ruins, etc. etc. I’ll cover that part of the trip in other posts.
The great big cherry on top of the trip was the 2 hours we were able to spend at Lufthansa’s First Class Terminal (FCT) in Frankfurt. It would have been nearly 3 hours, but we were a bit delayed departing Rome.
For those of you unfamiliar with the FCT, it is a dedicated stand alone terminal located just to the west of Terminal A at Frankfurt’s airport. Its designed primarily for people originating their travels in Frankfurt to entirely bypass entering the regular terminal. Although the terminal can be used by passengers connecting through Frankfurt who are arriving or departing on First Class Lufthansa tickets. It’s fairly easy to get there from the other terminals. From Terminal A you leave the secure (airside) part of the terminal, and before exiting the terminal near the front doors, take the escalator downstairs to the baggage claim level. Be careful not to follow the signs for the Welcome Lounge. It is an entirely different lounge and has nothing to do with the FCT. From there you exit the terminal, turn left and walk perhaps 500 yards/metres towards the taxi queue. The FCT is next to this queue. You can reach the FCT from Terminal B by taking the tram to A and go from there.
This is the entrance to the FCT from the lower level:
Once you enter, there is an elevator to the left that brings you up to the main level where you will be met by a Personal Assistant who will take care of your documentation (you hand over your passport and boarding passes to him or her for processing) and introduce you to the Terminal. Directly from there you go through a very civilized security screening process since you are technically airside once inside the FCT.
In our case, it was my wife’s first time and our UBER FANTASTIC Personal Assistant, Hendrik, took it upon himself to give her the guided tour of the entire facility and explained what she would be experiencing while at FCT.
Once you pass security directly to your left is a small, but very nice Duty Free Shop and then the floor plan opens up to the rest of the terminal. Here are a few pictures that she took while walking around:
The very nicely populated bar
From there to the left is the private dining area where you can order items directly from a menu. Consider this a restaurant within the terminal.
A typical place setting:
Next are images from the self service buffet area. There is a lot more food than the photos indicate. There are dozens of platters/stations to try. Their variety and quality of the food is excellent. Everything from the basics to extremely creative dishes are available. The several that I sampled, were all excellent!
Additionally there were 2 very impressive carving stations:
Also available was a very well stocked Wine Cart where you can serve yourself:
Here are a few other pictures of the area including the magazine/newspaper rack which has both German and English titles available:
Views from my seat:
And of course a couple of our ducks escaped my carry on to take a nip at a very fine Glenmorangie Single Malt:
Other parts of the terminal that are not pictured include the impressive Cigar Lounge with a great variety of Ports, Grappa, etc. and the Shower/Restroom area.
Approximately 15 minutes before our scheduled departure, Hendrik returned to escort us to our waiting Porsche Cayenne that would take us directly to our waiting 744 for our flight to Chicago. As part of this, you are “processed” out of Germany in the FCT’s dedicated Passport Control:
Once our passports are stamped and returned to us, we part ways with Hendrik and are shown to the waiting Porsche (sorry for the blurry image, tried taking it one handed):
I was able to capture the video of the ride out to the aircraft. Watch it here:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rCBPAlRGXYw[/youtube]
I want to take this opportunity to share what happened to us while visiting the FCT and in my opinion the amazing care we received.
If you are not aware, Lufthansa offers little theme inspired rubber ducks as a souvenir for your visit to either the FCT, or any Lufthansa First Class Lounge in Frankfurt and Munich. The duck is usually waiting for you in the shower room if you decide to grab a shower, but you can also ask for one directly. For some (not me of course…..) its a personal mission to try and acquire these “enten” (german for duck). The ducks are labeled based on whether they are from a lounge or FCT and whether from Frankfurt or Munich. In my opinion, I would suggest that the FCT duck is the more difficult to acquire. So in the days, weeks and months leading up to the trip I kept telling my wife how critically important it is that we visit the FCT to get their version of the duck. My wife gets into the spirit of things and agrees to the duck hunt. Once we arrive to the FCT and Hendrik leaves us to enjoy our time, my wife goes back to the shower/bathroom area to get her FCT duck. To her shock, the attendant says we have no more ducks. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. All this build up by me since February, and there’s no duck. Understandably, my wife is disappointed that there will be no FCT duck to take home with us. Apparently they had a run on the ducks during the previous 2 weeks due to increased passenger traffic due to Oktoberfest.
During our stay at the FCT, Hendrik checks in with us to see how things are going and I share with him the fact that they are out of ducks. In a joking way, I tell him that we are let down that no FCT duck will go home with us. Hendrik couldn’t believe that they were duck-less and commits to finding a resolution. I figure he’ll look around and report that none could be found. Oh well, not the end of the world I guess.
So time passes on and our departure time arrives. We are taken downstairs to the Porsche, processed and go plane side. We board and settle into our seats thinking what a great experience FCT was, even without the ducky souvenir. As we are sitting there waiting for the doors to close, in walks a Lufthansa representative and finds our seats. He looks at my wife and says: “Mrs. LufthansaFlyer, this is for you”. I look over and see an FCT duck sitting in the middle of his cupped hands. My wife is beaming ear to ear. I never imagined that anything like this would happen. Taking up valuable resources and time to track down a duck and deliver it to a passenger waiting in her seat? Simply WOW. It is safe to assume that Mrs. LufthansaFlyer has become a Lufthansa fan for life. She could not believe that they went to all that trouble to have a duck delivered to her at her seat.
This is the little guy:
We thank him profusely and literally within a second or 2 of him exiting the plane, the doors are sealed and we start our journey home. We’ve been home for 3 days, and when we talk about the trip, this FCT experience is the one that we talk about the most among all the other great things we had seen and experienced.
Thank you Lufthansa for going above and beyond and creating a fantastic experience and memory for us!!!
The end of November kicks off The Christmas Market season throughout Europe. Its a time when cities and villages set up special areas that celebrate the coming of Christmas. These celebrations usually take place in parks or town squares and are comprised of booths selling local foods, holiday decor and other gifts. Typically, they’ll have a children’s area complete with rides, petting zoos and other attractions geared for the kids.
I was prompted to write this tonight because as I was scouring airfares to Europe, I noticed many fares available on Lufthansa from most US gateway cities to destinations in Germany and further into Europe are at their lowest prices this year. For example, You can fly in Business Class from Chicago to Munich for approximately $1800.00, from the New York Area for about $1600.00. These fares typically require you to leave the Friday after Thanksgiving and you can return almost any day the following week. If you do fly in a premium cabin, you will most likely earn bonus status miles for your frequent flyer account which adds to the benefit of such attractive fares. Usually a business class fare will run between $4000-6000 during other times of the year. Book soon since available seats will start to disappear the closer we get to the holiday weekend.
So why not skip the lines and misery of shopping on Black Friday and take care of your shopping in Europe???? Hop on a plane, enjoy the hospitality of a great Business Class Seat and experience something new that you’ll remember for a long time. You can visit www.christmasmarkets.com and find more information on specific Christmas Markets in Germany and the rest of Europe.
